Summer’s end[Oct 2018]

KOBORI Sojitsu (the 13th Grand Master of the Enshu Sado School )

October has finally arrived. Have we ever been hit by a heat wave as terrible as this summer? It may have been the first time in history. It has been a long time since we heard the words heat stroke and the number of those who have been hospitalized or died from it is likely the highest it has ever been.


Regarding the natural disasters that I have been writing about regularly in this journal, as the days go by, the amount of damage and the numbers of casualties continue to rise. It is the members of our self-defense forces and volunteers who deal with these events. Their activities must be extremely challenging this summer, exacerbated by the heat and time pressure. I believe those of us who are not present in these locations must show our respect and gratitude to these noble men and women and must also proactively know more about their activities. I say this because I have the impression that there are increasingly more Japanese people who stand idly by. The Japanese now have much more freedom than in the past with respect to their lifestyle and life values. On the other hand, people seem to becoming more indifferent towards others and their relationships with neighbors and those around them are becoming tenuous. Many people avoid being involved in things that do not directly concern them. As we move from the Heisei era to the next, it is important to us to have a broader vision of ourselves as individuals, our city, our school, and our country.


In the world of tea ceremony, with the arrival of autumn, there will be many tea ceremonies with the theme of nostalgia for the past season and the 'tsukimi'. The national meeting of the Enshu School will be held this year by the Tokyo federation and it seems that there will be a number of new trials. I am delighted to be able to attend this great event.


The essence of the art of tea is continuous ingenuity. In this search for something new, the harmony between people, between people and objects, and between objects themselves is what is important. I wish to spend the rest of the year with this in mind.